ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a subjective evaluation/ self-assessment exercise, in which informants were asked to identify, for each variable, one of a series of variants as the best usage, and also to identify their own usual usage. The variants selected for the exercise covered the entire relevant dialectological range: Received Pronunciation (RP), broad and less broad Liverpool usage, and broad and less broad Cheshire usage. The results were analysed auditorily, and the numerical data relating to usage were subjected to multiple regression analyses. The chapter examines the current patterning of variation associated with some phonological isoglosses of this nature in the West Wirral area. The general direction of change is obviously towards Liverpool/Birkenhead usage. The area is distinctive in that it is particularly middle-class in character, and displays larger proportions of high-prestige usage than most areas in north-west England.
